February 6

Polish President Andrzej Duda signed Poland's controversial new Holocaust bill late Tuesday ahead of it being assessed by the country's Constitutional Tribunal.

The law would make it illegal to accuse the nation of complicity in crimes committed by Nazi Germany, including the Holocaust.

The bill, which passed with 57 votes to 23 (with two abstentions) early Thursday morning, also bans the use of terms such as "Polish death camps" in relation to camps such as Auschwitz, which were located in Nazi-occupied Poland.

The legislation criminalizes any mention of Poles “being responsible or complicit in the Nazi crimes committed by the Third German Reich.” The harshest penalties are reserved for those who refer to Nazi-era concentration camps such as Auschwitz as “Polish death camps.”

Scenario 1

You are sitting on
a bus minding your own business, and a man comes over to you and tells you to
move, you can't sit here, there are rules about where you can sit, and you are
breaking them. What do you do?

a) You move - this
I call "passive complicity"

b) You take the man's
advice and become the advocate to the other "rule-breakers", encouraging them
to move as well, helping them to do so - this I call "collaboration in one's
own victimhood".

c) You say "My name
is Rosa Parks and I ain't moving" - this the whole world calls heroism, and
quite rightly, because it is also the most personally dangerous.

Scenario 2

You are sitting in
your stibl in Praszka, and a man in a black uniform with swastika armbands
tells you to move, you are being deported to the Lodz Ghetto. What do you do?

a) You get on the train ("passive complicity")

b) You become a
senior member of the Judenrat, like my great-great uncle Bernard Prasquier, and help out with the organisation and running of the ghetto ("collaboration in your own victimhood")

c) It’s Warsaw not
Lodz, and you become a senior member of Lochamei ha Getaot, like my cousin YakubPraszkier, who died in the Uprising (the "Rosa Parks" option)

Always three
options for the victims.

But what about the
perpetrators?

Scenario 3

A gang of youths approaches
you in the school playground, their leader making clear he wants your lunch.

Phase a: You give him your lunch. And the next day. And the next... ("passive complicity")

Phase b: By the fourth day he is telling you what he wants for
lunch and you are getting your mother to shop accordingly, while spending what little
pocket money you have on a secret second lunch which you eat in the toilet
during lessons so that nobody will know ("collaborating in your own victimhood")

Phase c: The gang-leader no longer wants your lunch; he wants your obedience, and for you to do his dirty work for him. And the dirty work in question is that kid over there's lunch from now on, and you to ensure he gets it. So you go over to the kid, and you tell him to hand over his
lunch, and he takes option 3, the Rosa Parks resistance-refusal option. But the gang are
watching, so you slap him. He starts to run, so you trip him. You drag him
upright and punch him, hard in the stomach. The gang are smiling approvingly.
You take his lunch from him and head back to the gang, but in the moment of
reaching into his bag everything changed: the gang has vanished, and what is
standing there is the school Principal, the teacher on duty in the playground,
and two student witnesses. They have the whole thing filmed on CCTV. The police
and your parents are being summoned. Expect to be suspended, at the very least.
You did what you did. Forced or unforced, you did what you did ("Polish death camps")

On March 26th 1963, the American world featherweight champion boxer Davey Moore died from injuries sustained in a fight. Bob Dylan lamented his death in a ballad, which I have borrowed to offer my own lament to the Polish President and Parliament:

"With my bow and arrow, I killed Cock Robin."
"Who saw him die?" "I," said the Fly,
"With my little eye, I saw him die."
"Who caught his blood?" "I," said the Fish,
"With my little dish, I caught his blood."
"Who'll make the shroud?" "I," said the Beetle,
"With my thread and needle, I'll make the shroud."
"Who'll dig his grave?" "I," said the Owl,
"With my pick and shovel, I'll dig his grave."
"Who'll be the parson?" "I," said the Rook,
"With my little book, I'll be the parson."
"Who'll be the clerk?" "I," said the Lark,
"If it's not in the dark, I'll be the clerk."
"Who'll carry the link?" "I," said the Linnet,
"I'll fetch it in a minute, I'll carry the link."
"Who'll be chief mourner?" "I," said the Dove,
"I mourn for my love, I'll be chief mourner."
"Who'll carry the coffin?" "I," said the Kite,
"If it's not through the night, I'll carry the coffin."
"Who'll bear the pall? "We," said the Wren,
"Both the cock and the hen, we'll bear the pall."
"Who'll sing a psalm?" "I," said the Thrush,
"As she sat on a bush, I'll sing a psalm."
"Who'll toll the bell?" "I," said the bull,
"Because I can pull, I'll toll the bell."
All the birds of the air fell a-sighing and a-sobbing,
When they heard the bell toll for poor Cock Robin.

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About Me

David Prashker was born
in London in 1955 and has lived in France, Israel, Canada and the United
States; now retired, he spent thirty years as a teacher, the last twelve as a Head of School.

He
is the author of thirty books, including contemporary and historical novels,
short stories, poetry, songs, plays and scholarly works, as well as multiple blogs; he is a painter, a musician, a singer-songwriter, the owner of his own publishing house - The Argaman Press - the author of TheBibleNet, and the founder and CEO of three political campaigns: The Campaign for a Charter of Human Responsibilities, The Campaign for Retail Transparency, and The Campaign for Real Democracy.

As a teacher and senior school administrator he has covered every age from nursery to adults, including day and boarding schools, religious schools, kibbutz schools, summer camps, and regular Shabbat morning Torah shi'urim for adults. His subjects include English, French and Hebrew language and literature, world religions, history, music and art.

David is a former teacher-mentor on the prestigious Project Sulam, and a Past President of PARDES, the day school network of Reform Jewish day schools in North America. He was the founding Chair of DAVAR, the Jewish Institute in Bristol (UK) and of the Bristol Anne Frank Society, has served on the Court of the University of Bath, the Standing Advisory Council for Religious Education in North Somerset (UK), and was founding director of The Polack's House Educational Trust.